Hi there! We’re finally here – welcome to the first installment of Distributed Ledger, our weekly crypto newsletter that will reach your inbox every Thursday. I’m Frances Yue, crypto reporter at MarketWatch, and I’ll walk you through the latest and greatest in digital assets this week so far.
Crypto in a snap
Ether
ETHUSD,
hit a record high at $4,669 on Wednesday, while the cryptocurrency has gained 11% over the past seven days. Bitcoin
BTCUSD,
recorded a 3.35% gain over the past seven days.
Dogecoin
DOGEUSD,
went down 14.2% for the past seven days, its worst 7-day performance since Sep. 21, according to Dow Jones data. Shiba Inu saw a loss of 31.9% over the past seven days, its worst 7-day performance since May 25.
Crypto Metrics
| Biggest Gainers | Price | % 7-day return |
| The Sandbox | $2.76 | 210% |
| Decentraland | $10.9 | 202.5% |
| Loopring | $1.09 | 130.2% |
| loTeX | $0.13 | 107.9% |
| Amp | $0.08 | 65.9% |
| Source: CoinMarketCap.com as of Nov. 4 |
| Biggest Decliners | Price | % 7-day return |
| Shiba Inu | $0.00004825 | -32.6% |
| Dogecoin | $0.26 | -21.8% |
| Harmony | $0.28 | -20.01% |
| Fantom | $2.48 | -18.89% |
| Curve DAO Token | $4.15 | -17.29% |
| Source: CoinMarketCap.com as of Nov.4 |
Shiba’s magic
The trading volume of Shiba Inu recently surpassed that of bitcoin for at least three consecutive days on KuCoin, the world’s third-largest crypto exchange based on trading volume, according to Johnny Lyu, KuCoin’s CEO. On Oct. 28, SHIB’s volume was almost three times that of bitcoin.
KuCoin primarily targets retail investors, Lyu said.
As the world’s third most googled cryptocurrency, Shiba Inu notched a gain of more than 380% for the past 30 days and rallied more than 76,000,000% over the past 12 months.
“Seeing bitcoin’s rise, some younger investors without a lot of money want to profit from crypto as well,” Lyu said. “But you’d need over $60,000 to buy one bitcoin. So they turn to Dogecoin and SHIB, where you buy tons using just $100.” A bitcoin can be divided into 100 million satoshi, its smallest unit.
“These investors are very passionate about such tokens and are determined to push the prices higher,” Lyu said. On Change.org, a petition to get SHIB listed on Robinhood has received more than 490,000 signatures.
Despite SHIB’s loss of about 30% over the past seven days, Lyu said he would hold the meme coin in the long term, along with bitcoin and dogecoin. Bitcoin can be seen as a hedge against inflation, while the dog-themed coins represent the power of community, according to Lyu.
Meta’s Metaverse
Meta
FB,
or previously Facebook, aims to build a Metaverse. Though it seems crypto and non-fungible tokens will play a role in it, the crypto community is not too happy.
“It’s a great endorsement that we’re in a sector that’s poised to break out into the mainstream,” Robby Yung, CEO at Animoca Brands, which owns metaverse-related game The Sandbox, told MarketWatch in an interview.
“On the other hand, it concerns me because I think part of the vision and the dream for us, at least, with the metaverse is that it’s a very open place,” Yung said. “And Facebook, unfortunately, doesn’t have a great history of openness.”
Lucas Outumuro, head of research at data analytics firm IntoTheBlock recently wrote in notes that Meta’s Metaverse “is expected to result in an opaque and less secure network where value created does not accrue to its users as would be the case in a decentralized platform like Ethereum.”
After Facebook announced its name change, The Sandbox (SAND) and another metaverse-related token Decentraland (MANA) recorded 210% and 200% gain over the past seven days, respectively.
The surges are “a strong statement of what crypto investors think of #Meta’s centralized vision.” Noelle Acheson, head of market insights at Genesis Trading wrote on Twitter.
The jump also shows “a bet that the increase in global attention on metaverse potential will drive even more rapid decentralized innovation,” Acheson wrote.
Squid Scam
On Nov. 1, Squid Game (SQUID), a cryptocurrency that has drawn attention in part because of the popular namesake Korean TV show, collapsed to nearly zero after it rose to $2,857 from $39 in just three hours, according to CoinMarketCap.
The dive happened not long after the crypto was listed at decentralized crypto exchange PancakeSwap on Oct. 21. SQUID rallied from $0.01 to $39 from Oct. 26 to Oct. 31.
On-chain data and evidence from Twitter and Telegram pointed to the incident as a “rug pull” scam, meaning that creators of a cryptocurrency abandoned the project and cashed out the tokens. CoinMarketCap issued a warning saying it received multiple reports that users were not able to sell the token at PancakeSwap.
On SQUID’s official Telegram channel, the developers left their last message – they said someone attempted to hack the crypto’s twitter account and smart contracts.
“We are trying to protect it but the price is still abnormal. Squid Game Dev does not want to continue running the project as we are depressed from the scammers and is overwhelmed with stress,” the team wrote.
“Sorry again for any inconvenience been made for you. If any strange starts coming out of it, ignore it. Thanks!”
It almost sounds like a dark joke, but the bloody costs for investors again point to the importance for individuals to do their own due diligence before investing in any cryptocurrencies, analysts said.
“It’s somewhat ironic that Squid, an altcoin based on a show about dystopian capitalism, proved to scam crypto speculators out of several millions of dollars,” Christopher Vecchio, senior strategist at market research site DailyFX wrote to MarketWatch in an email.
“The latest rug pull is unfortunate but predictable, and underscores the reality that market participants should avoid speculating in new altcoins without a legitimate use case, particularly those that you can only buy and never sell – which was an obvious red flag from the start.”
Crypto companies, funds
In crypto-related company news, shares of Coinbase
COIN,
went down 0.15% to $343.8 early afternoon New York time on Thursday. It was up 7.7% for the last five trading days. Michael Saylor’s MicroStrategy Inc.
MSTR,
slumped 1.35% to $799.3 at Thursday afternoon. It was up 11.5% over the last five days.
Mining company Riot Blockchain Inc.
RIOT,
shares dropped 0.8% to $32.5 on Thursday. It notched a 18% gain over the past five days. Shares of Marathon Digital Holdings Inc.
MARA,
slid 1.4% to $63.8 Thursday afternoon. It gained 26.5% over the last five trading days.
Another miner Ebang International Holdings Inc.
EBON,
declined 0.6% to $2.19. It was up 0.77% over the last five trading days.
Overstock.com Inc.
OSTK,
went up 0.32%, trading at $105, with a 13.2% gain over the last five days. Square Inc.
SQ,
fell 2.2% to $246.8, down 5.5% over the last five days. while Tesla Inc.’s
TSLA,
shares rose 1.76% to $1,235, recording a gain of 14.7% over the past five trading days. .
PayPal Holdings Inc.
PYPL,
fell 2% to $225, logging a 4.7% loss over the past five days, while NVIDIA
NVDA,
was up 13.7% to $303, contributing to a 21% gain over the past five days. Advanced Micro Devices Inc.
AMD,
jumped 5.6% to $138 and notched a 13.7% return over the past five days.
In the fund space, ProShares Bitcoin Strategy ETF
BITO,
dropped 3.22% to $39.1 Thursday afternoon, while Valkyrie Bitcoin Strategy ETF
BTF,
declined 2% to $24.
Grayscale Bitcoin Trust
GBTC,
dropped 3% to $49, with a 0.3% loss over the past five days.
